B-Mets' Brandon Nimmo carving a path to majors

Binghamton Mets outfielder Brandon Nimmo was the 13th overall pick in the 2011 draft. Nimmo was the first draft pick of the current New York Mets front office regime and the highest draft pick ever out of Wyoming.(Photo: Kristopher Radder / Staff photo)Buy Photo

Story Highlights

Brandon Nimmo has made the adjustment to Double-A after being an All-Star at High-A.

Nimmo was the first draft pick (13th overall) of Sandy Alderson's tenure as Mets general manager.

Nimmo carries the distinction of being the highest draft pick out of Wyoming.

In his second year of full-season professional baseball, Nimmo's power has started to blossom.

BINGHAMTON –Brandon Nimmo batted leadoff most of this season between Single-A St. Lucie and the Binghamton Mets. His job has been to pave the way and set the table for those who follow.

In his third professional season, Nimmo, a 6-foot-3, 207-pound left-handed hitting outfielder from the wind-ravaged fields of Cheyenne, Wyo., is not only a flag bearer for a lineup. He is carrying the flag of Sandy Alderson's New York Mets front office regime as well as that of baseball in Wyoming.

Nimmo, the eighth-ranked prospect in the Mets farm system according to Baseball America, and the B-Mets begin the divisional round of the Eastern League playoffs against the Portland Sea Dogs at 6:35 on Wednesday night at NYSEG Stadium.

After early struggles at Double-A that included going 2-for-16 in his first six games, Nimmo's offense picked up. His average ticked up to .243 in July (27 games) and .263 in August (26 games).

"You being able to adjust is the difference between High-A and Double-A, so I think that was my adjustment period and I know I'll have another adjustment period," Nimmo said prior to a recent home game. "Things have been going well. I'm just trying to keep them going forward. I'm not too concerned right now."

Lots of eyes follow every move made by Nimmo, who turned 21 in March. The Mets selected him 13th overall in the 2011 draft, two spots after Houston Astros top outfield prospect George Springer, who made his big-league debut this season, and one spot before Miami Marlins phenom pitcher Jose Fernandez.

That selection marked the Mets' first draft pick after Alderson took over as the general manager and installed former Oakland Athletics assistant general manager and former Los Angeles Dodgers general manager Paul DePodesta as vice president of player development and amateur scouting.

Nimmo's selection raised many eyebrows in large part because the winter weather drags on so long in Wyoming, the state does not sponsor high school baseball. American Legion offers the highest level of competition for high school aged players.

"Regardless of his amateur background, we felt he had a mature approach at the plate, an ability to add strength, and a makeup that was truly special," DePodesta said in an email. "We were confident that he'd put in all of the necessary work to be as good as he could be ... and without anyone telling him that the work needed to be done."

Carving out the path

While Nimmo attempts to blaze a trail for players from Wyoming, he credits another Cheyenne native for paving his way: his older brother Bryce.

"Without my brother I wouldn't be where I am today, because he just pushed me to push myself," Nimmo said. "He kind of had to be the guinea pig. I hate it. I hate that he was, but he did kind of pave the way for the rest of us because he was the first guy, I think, in 12 years to go to a D-1 school for baseball out of Cheyenne, Wyoming.

"And then I ended up being the first to go higher than the sixth round in the draft. I think him breaking those barriers and beating all the odds, I think that is what helped push me to say, 'Hey, this is possible, and I can go even farther.' "

Bryce, who is eight years older than his brother, built a reputation as a star pitcher and outfielder for America Legion Post 6 in Cheyenne. Bryce, who now sells medical equipment in the Omaha, Neb., played for Post 6 as an eighth grader, and by the time he went to college the program had won four state championships. He played for the University of Nebraska as an outfielder.

"Bryce set a standard in our program for us," Post 6 coach Tagg Lain said. "He set a standard of excellence."

Lain brought Brandon, then an unknown, with him in the Tournament of Stars in North Carolina in 2010. Nimmo played well enough to earn an invite to the Under Armour All-American game at Wrigley Field in Chicago, which he almost turned down because it would interfere with Legion. He ended up playing, and earned MVP for his team in the All-American game.

Brandon Nimmo honed his skills year-round thanks to a barn roughly 100 feet from his home. Bryce didn't get to practice in the 60-foot by 40-foot structure until his senior year, but Brandon got to train and craft his swing there starting at the age of 12. Nimmo's father, Ron, came up with the idea after realizing how much it could have helped Bryce train.

Half of it served as a batting cage. The other half was concrete with a basketball hoop and doubled as a garage for to keep the cars covered in the case of a big snow storm. There was also a game room where they could play ping pong, darts, and Guitar Hero.

Brandon set Post 6 records for batting average, home runs, triples, and walks. He ranks second to his brother in doubles, hits, runs batted in, and runs scored.

"I wanted to take down every single one of those," Nimmo said of his brother's records. "It's not because I didn't like my brother or anything. It's just because I always wanted to one-up my brother. He always set such high standards going through that program and going through his high school."

Finding his way in pro ball

Nimmo signed with the Mets and played 10 games in the 2011 season for their Gulf Coast League and Appalachian League (Rookie level) affiliates when he was young enough to still play for his American Legion team. Nimmo batted .211 in those 10 games with eight hits and 14 strikeouts.

The next season he held his own with Brooklyn in the New York-Penn League, a short-season Single-A league filled mostly with players who played in college. He batted .248 with a .372 on-base percentage and hit six home runs and collected 40 RBIs in 69 games.

Last season, he played 110 games for Low-A Savannah and helped that team to a South Atlantic League championship. Nimmo batted .273 with a .397 on-base percentage, a .359 slugging percentage, 16 doubles, six triples, two home runs, 40 RBIs. He showed the strike zone discipline the Mets covet, racking up 71 walks.

Nimmo, who was listed at 185 pounds last season, bulked up to 207 bounds through a program that included nutrition, weight training, baseball-specific training, speed and agility drills, flexibility exercises and even vision training.

"He came in with his man strength this year: Bigger shoulders, stronger, still athletic, but we could all tell that he had got some size," Mets Director of Player Development Dicky Scott said in May. "It has really helped his swing too. He's just really maturing physically. He loves to play the game, plays hard and the guy is an on-base machine."

Nimmo earned Florida State League midseason All-Star honors while with St. Lucie before his promotion to Binghamton. Combined between the two levels, Nimmo this season has scored 97 runs, driven in 51 runs, hit 21 doubles, nine triples, 10 home runs and logged an on-base percentage of .396 to go along with a .429 slugging percentage.

"We're very pleased with where Brandon is right now," DePodesta said in an email. "Since this is just his age 21 season, we're very happy that he has spent the second half of the season in AA and is already making the adjustments to succeed at that level. For a guy who didn't play with the amateur competition in somewhere like Florida or Southern California, he has been very quick to make adjustments at each and every level."

Big things ahead

Nimmo has just begun to tap into his power potential with added muscle this season on his 6-foot-3 frame. He has as many home runs this season as his previous seasons combined.

B-Met manager Pedro Lopez has put Nimmo in the leadoff spot 41 times in 61 games, but he believes his future will include batting near the middle of the lineup.

"I'm almost positive that's going to be his role whenever he gets to the big leagues," Lopez said. "... He's got some pop. He drive the ball to all fields."

Now that he's no longer chasing big brother, Nimmo has has found other driving forces.

"Now I'm chasing my personal dream of being a major-league baseball player," Nimmo said. "Once I got drafted it's all about leaving no regrets that I gave it everything that I had. I like to think that I'm not only making a name for myself, and I'm trying to uphold a reputation of my family — obviously I want the Nimmo name to be a well-known name and I want to honor my parents and my brother — but also just the fact that people hear Wyoming and they chuckle."

Nimmo bristles at the idea that baseball does not count or is not played at the same level in Wyoming as in other parts of the country.

"In Cheyenne, baseball continues to get bigger and bigger and kids dreams continue to get bigger and bigger," Lain said. "People follow him and not just in our program. People across the state follow Brandon."

Mets fans all over the Northeast also follow Nimmo. On the road or at home, he does interviews and he stops to takes pictures and talk with folks who are eagerly awaiting his arrival in New York. Their expectations never seem to overwhelm him. He greets them all with a smile.

Then again, it shouldn't be surprising considering Nimmo embraced his brother's mantle as the guy paving the way for an entire region of baseball players.

"If anybody out there that's from where I am back in Wyoming — and I know that South Dakota is similar to that and North Dakota — if they have a dream that they want to be a professional baseball player, a major-league baseball player," Nimmo says, "I want to be one of those guys that broke through the barriers and said, 'If you work hard enough. If you make the sacrifices and have no regrets about what you do. You work as hard as you can, then dreams can come true.' "

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Binghamton Mets outfielder Brandon Nimmo runs down the third-base line against the New Hampshire Fisher Cats during a game at NYSEG Stadium.(Photo: KRISTOPHER RADDER / Staff Photo)